There will be a STUDENT ONLY Park and Plaza" with Live Bands and DJ's. BRILLIANT. Hope someone at RU is paying attention!!!
OT'ish: NW's "New" Ryan Field Update Student "focus"
- Thread starter AreYouNUTS
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IMO, the missing piece of the RU puzzle. The colored lots offer tons of folks a very close place to tailgate. Our lots can rival anyone’s. The Boardwalk is awesome! Totally jersey. Totally cool, especially for families and younger kids. Athletes Glen and beer garden are great. Bandstand-Cheer-Band-ScarletWalk all great
But, what about the students?? Where can they gather? Where can they tailgate? Unlike most schools, ( was at MD yesterday) that have one coherent campus, we’ve got 4. Very difficult and time constrained to get the students to Busch, especially for our usual games at noon. A large segment of the student is tailgating/daging on College Ave because there is no where for them to get together on Busch. The Alley was amazing, for 2 games, but RU shut it down.
I would propose a large fenced in area amongst the trees of Johnson Park. Middlesex Cty runs it. Common stage and DJ. Student IDs only. Pay to get admission bands ( see the frat lot at USCar). Students can walk or get buses there. They can easily walk/bus home. They have a free ticket. The team is doing its part and the GameDay ops have been great. The Game is fun. Give them a reason to wake up and get there as well. Time that RU tried to create fans. Free tee shirt or hot dog isn’t it. Students want the Event, the Party, the GameDay.
I’m a frat advisor. The guys want to go and tailgate at the stadium, but have no where to go. In conjunction with a sorority, we acquired 9 blue passes and have alumni with 3/4 more for Wisconsin. Everyone met at 6:45am to drive in together. Not easy to motivate college students that early. Both groups invited parents and we have several hundred people, a DJ, 5 tents and most went into the game. The next weekend we put the 350+ people behind the chapter house for Homecoming and no one went to the game. A ton of effort went into that. Simply not happening each week.
First game or two, all the freshmen come out. Any night games will draw the students. The rest of the games are getting decent/marginal student turnouts. Minnesota game was weak. My guess is Illinois will be weak as well, especially for a University as large as ours.
RU needs to create space for the students. Police it so no one gets out of hand. The students just want to have music, friends, cute boys/girls and a college GameDay and fun like we all did too. Businesses will pay to sponsor. Groups can rent tents within. If done right, it will even generate $$ for Middlesex Cty. Make it a GameDay, not just a game
is a good idea but needs more thought. A student-only area in JP or Rutgers lot couldn’t get away with having alcohol…a quasi-requirement for students if you want good attendance.
Hence the suggestion of Johnson Park. Hence the idea of admission fee and sponsorships and tent rentals. Everyone understands the $$
Yes, referenced JP. Point is, any student-only space will be booze-enforced. RU and the county cops can be more lax in areas with a preponderance of 21+ people. Can’t let the student only areas go un-checked. But the general idea is good.
You can have a 21+ area and an under-21 area IMHO. Really NOT that difficult and everyone is happy.
So, it’s a free tailgate area for the seniors and people that can afford good IDs? Who wants to in the under 21 area? Isn’t that the boardwalk?
Students who are under-21 and want their OWN space to listen to the same band/DJ that the over-21 crowd is listening to while not having to deal with families that occupy the boardwalk? As someone who tailgates in the front row of Blue, every home game, I can tell you that there are NO students just "hanging out" at The Boardwalk. They may walk though (Busch students), or stop at one of the food trucks, but that's it.
Also, 75% of the students - I'd guess - come from the other campuses. Busses drop off at Johnson Park. Party would be right there. Fun for ALL students!
I guess you missed the point. They don’t want to tailgate if they can’t drink. There is no point having a under 21 area.
Didn't "miss" anything. I just disagree wholeheartedly. You can't have have a "student zone" and say "no thanks" to 75% of your underclassmen. That won't cut the mustard AND it's incredibly short-sighted IMHO.
Is SHI considered on-campus?
That’s the issue - need easier way for students to get across the river.
That’s the issue - need easier way for students to get across the river.
if Rutgers did this, I might enroll in a grad class every fall semester just to have access !
I think the Johnson Park idea has a ton of potential. Do it near where everyone is crossing over anyway. I am guessing it would require some kind of financial agreement between Rutgers and the county, but whatever. The space is already set up for picnics/tailgating.
Aesthetically yes
Realistically too many hoops to jump through with middlesex county. It would never happen
I respect your opinion but don’t agree. My experience working with the county has been very collaborative and productive.
They could easily have a tent city for students at the Werblin lawn for a giant tailgate but the school doesn't care and can't look the other way with alcohol. They tried having stuff at the Werblin lawn years ago, but very few students went because of the alcohol restrictions.
Looking the other way with alcohol would require a huge leap of faith. So what can be done? Any area worth its salt would need to check IDs and/or have over 21 and under 21 sections. Still opening a can of worms, but want to see something for students.
I'm not advocating looking the other way, but plenty of schools have figured out how to have good student tailgates. Rutgers doesn't even try anymore.
Nobody advocates looking the other way
They just do it
That time has passed. New generations working together. Just have to make the right connections to make it happen.
I agree with this. Kids start drinking in HS, same as it always was. In college, the underage kids would rather hang where they won’t be harassed by cops for drinking.
The drinking age raised to 21 is just stupid. Should be 18 at most. Then ther would be no issue.
The liability concerns are such that the school can take no part in arranging a student tailgate without also being seen working hard to prevent underage drinking. And the kids will want to drink, just like us at their age. So… I think it’s a lost cause.
And there’s the major snag. No university or public entity will want to deal with the liability.
I hate to say it, but I agree with you. Maybe try the 21 and over thing and see how it goes.
Definitely missed it. I’m saying it’s not worth it or bad idea to have a 21+ and under 21 student zone.
I stop reading after 850 million
We’re missing out on future generations of season ticket holders, boosters and NIL contributors bc nobody wants to work a the students
I’ve been to multiple other places and none has the drocanian policies we have
It’s short sighted, foolish and unessessary, and costing us millions of dollars in future revenue
Somebody needs to step up and figure this out - it’s not rocket science, and is long overdue
I’ve been to multiple other places and none has the drocanian policies we have
It’s short sighted, foolish and unessessary, and costing us millions of dollars in future revenue
Somebody needs to step up and figure this out - it’s not rocket science, and is long overdue
Right? Stick that 850 million into an NIL fund.
I mean, if player X is choosing between school A who are offering $1M per year in NIL and have a crazy stadium, or school B who are offering $3M per year but only have an average stadium, what do you think player X is going to choose? This is not a complicated question.
RU can't come close to matching on NIL for top players yet. Once we have that higher priority figured out, we can start winning and then we can more quickly justify a big spend on a new stadium or the Big Al Fieldhouse project.
I know where you’re coming from and I know that’s been Rutgers stance . Just avoiding liability altogether.
But many of the big ten conference mates have a beer hall on campus at the student center for crying out loud.
The students are drinking longer and harder and in much much more precarious environments at the moment
Any on-campus beer hall will be checking id’s and not allowing underage drinking, right? Nobody is disputing that RU could set up a tailgate area for 21+ students. Just saying there’s little point to an under 21 student tailgate area since those kids would rather be pregaming where they can drink.
And I’m saying I understand what you’re saying but I completely disagree. I’m not “missing” anything.
This school is the worst in the nation when it comes to grooming future donors. I’ve discussed this before and hundreds of different threads.
Hopefully will get done soon AND ignoring the under 21 students - which is 75% or more of your undergraduate population - would be beyond foolish and shortsighted.
The Ryan family chose to give this money for this specific purpose. No other purpose. Maybe they don’t believe in NIL maybe they gave additional funds for NIL, who knows, but they’re building a new stadium and all the goodies to go along with it because it was desperately needed at Northwestern.
That’s perception. Once it’s no longer considered a safety school, grads will have pride in it and donations will come. The first part is already happening.
